656 THE HADES OF HOMER. 



ling, going either liere or there." The question at once arises, Why 

 could not Circe herself, goddess as she was, give Ulysses all the infor- 

 mation which he required; and especially, as she is represented in 

 Odyssey XII. as furnishing him, after his return from Hades, with 

 much ampler details regarding his homeward voyage than Tiresias 

 gave. It does not seem, therefore, that Homer has assigned a pur- 

 pose sufl&ciently grand and awful for the descent of Ulysses into 

 Hades. 



It was in order to ascertain the future history of his descendants 

 that ^neas was asked to visit the lower regions : 



"Tiim geuus omne tuurn, et qufe dentur moenia, disces." 



The manifest design of Yirgil was to shed all the honour that was 

 possible on the family of Caesar, and to trace back, through successive 

 stages of brilliant renown, the Roman race to ^neas and his imme-, 

 diate followers. Well versed as the poet was in the history of Rome, 

 he, with a grandeur of conception which is bold and graphic, repre^ 

 sents Anchises in Elysium as busily engaged among those souls "fot 

 whom other bodies are destined by fate," and by whom the Roman 

 heroes that are to be are to be animated. Expression is given to 

 pantheistic views respecting the spirit which " nourishes the heavens, 

 the earth and watery plains, and mingles with the vast body of the 

 universe." Recourse is had to the doctrine of metempsychosis, in 

 order to shew how the souls with whom Anchises is actively engaged 

 are, after a sufficient and satisfactory process of purification, to revisit 

 the earth, and to animate those who are to shed immortal honour on 

 the Roman name in the ages that are yet to be. Before the vivid 

 and fertile imagination of the poet, there pass in rapid succession 

 those who were worthiest and bravest and most patriotic among the 

 Romans. This noble advice was given for the guidance of coming 

 generations : 



' ' Tu regere imperio populos, Romane, memento ; 

 Hae tibi erunt artes ; pacisque imponere morem, 

 Parcere subjectis, et debeUare superbos." 



The enumeration of the great and good and heroic who were to 

 appear on the scene of Roman life and action as the ages rolled away, 

 terminates with the affecting and memorable allusion to Marcellus, 

 the son of Octavia, the sister of Augustus. It must be granted that 



